Construction Of Womanhood In Seto Dharti And Yogmaya
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Department of English
Abstract
Amar Neupane‟s Seto Dharti (2012) and Neelam Karki Niharika‟s Yogmaya
(2018) build the two complementary versions of social reality of the then
contemporary Nepali society. The novels depict how the patriarchal social system has
become an obstacle in the path of women‟s progress. Both the novels portray the pain
and suffering of the women in Nepali society, by exposing certain events from history
and contemporary Nepali society. The suffering of female characters becomes the
main subject matter in both the novels. The women confront the patriarchal structure,
become the victims of it, resist it, and finally pose a challenge through spiritual
means. Similarly, there are functional women who are means of the larger social-
political structure. The women are forced to adopt the dominant patriarchal ideology.
They appear as domestic workers and the machine to bear children. This study has
employed feminism as frame of analysis for the novels to examine the condition of
women. Key concepts of gender and marginality of women from Gayatri Chakraborty
Spivak, Judith Butler, and other relevant theorists are used to interpret the texts in
both the novels. Contemporary Nepali women basically appear in three roles: social
conformist, victims, and resisters. Those who pursue change in society take the form
of rebel in both the texts. In fact, the study explores the role of rebels in the making of
contemporary self of women in Nepal.